New York State's budget gap through fiscal 2018-19 could be a whopping $4.6 billion worse than indicated by Governor Cuomo's latest Division of the Budget (DOB) projections, according to new estimates from state Comptroller Thomas DiNapoli. [Read_more]

Until a few months ago, Governor Cuomo could boast of producing an "on-time budget" in each of his first six years in office. But he also continues to steadily build on another kind of record: for a seventh consecutive year, he has now missed the statutory deadline for issuing the state's Mid-Year Financial Plan Update. [Read_more]

Governor Andrew Cuomo today staged a public joint conference-call with California Governor Jerry Brown to discuss the impact on their respective states of a proposal to eliminate the state and local tax deduction (SALT on federal income taxes. [Read_more]

The September cash report from the state comptroller's office—an important indicator of New York's fiscal health at the halfway mark of the fiscal year—highlights growing budgetary worries for Governor Cuomo and (ultimately) the Legislature.

The report showed that total state tax receipts through September 30 had come in $387 million below the level projected for that period in the First Quarterly Update issued in July—which itself reflected a $1.6 billion downward adjustment from the cash flow projection in the Executive Budget presented by Cuomo in January. [Read_more]

Vice President Pence visited western New York to tout a federal tax reform plan that could still end up saving less for Buffalo area taxpayers than their counterparts elsewhere in the country. [Read_more]

New York's loss of residents to other states is a long-established and troubling trend. But the impact of out-migration on the Empire State's economy, and on personal income in particular, is another, more complicated story.

Unfortunately, the annual release of Internal Revenue Service (IRS) data on interstate taxpayer migration continues to inspire some wrongheaded conclusions on this score. [Read_more]

A historic decline in the uninsured population continued in 2016, both nationwide and in New York, albeit at a slower rate that signals a plateauing trend, according to data released Tuesday by the Census Bureau. [Read_more]

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About the Empire Center

The Empire Center is an independent, non-partisan, non-profit think tank located in Albany, New York. Our mission is to make New York a better place to live and work by promoting public policy reforms grounded in free-market principles, personal responsibility, and the ideals of effective and accountable government.